Beginnings are never easy. I think someone said that. Anyway, in archaeology there are many beginnings: the first season, the first dig, the first morning in the field, the first time you stick the trowel to the ground, the first time you fill in your pottery tag …. Every beginning is different and can be experienced in a different way. But going back to the site that you know you have left with only half excavated square means you can count on some clean up. It means that after two years there would be some grass or that some things might not be there as you have left them. It is always a bit stressful not knowing if someone was grazing the sheep, if there were some activities that resulted in collapsed walls or something worse. So this season started just like every other with a 4am alatm clock, breakfast, drive to the site, taking photos, preparing the notes, putting up the sift, filling the tags, opening the clean up tag in the ipad and learning the names of your co-workers.

After all the preparations you are ready to start digging. No. You are ready to start cleaning up 🙂 The worst part is the grass. The roots seem like they grow from the inner earth. But then you have to remove the large stones that you put there at the end of the last season (to secure the walls) and that is when you start remembering why so many of the volunteers never return to the dig.

If you have good workers the clean up will go easy and in no time you just might see some progress and continue your excavation process.